I’ll explain. For some time now we’ve had a number of, worsening, problems with Nat & Han, mainly:
1) That they are continually arguing about nothing;
2) That they can't be relied on to get themselves up in the morning without being micro-managed and
3) They won't go to bed when they’re told.
On two occasions over the weekend, I had already had to remonstrate with them about arguing and I was becoming increasingly irritated by the other things.
Every morning it’s as if they’ve never ever had to get up for school before, they have to be cajoled to get out of bed, to stay out of bed, to wash, to brush their teeth, to dress, to eat their breakfasts, to brush their hair etc etc etc.
Every evening, it seems, there’s an argument about them going to bed, Nat wants to stay up later than Han who wants to stay up as long as he does. When, eventually, they go upstairs they proceed to run riot and I almost invariably end up screaming at them to settle down.
Well on Monday night (30/3/9 – for posterity) we finally had our very own perfect storm; it all came to a head - BIGTIME!
They’d been allowed to stay up until 9.00 but had been told,in no uncertain manner, that as soon as The Gadget Show finished they had to go straight to bed because Deb and I wanted to watch Law & Order UK which:
1) is not suitable viewing for children of their ages, and;
2) Requires a modicum of concentration and quite if you’re going to follow the rapid plot developments (it’s effectively made up of 2 separate but conjoined stories).
Them: BANG BANG BANG SCREAM SCREAM SHOUT BANG SHOUT SCREAM
Me: “Shut up or I’ll come up there and kill you, you little (expletive[s] deleted)”. **
Them: BANG SCREAM SHOUT SCREAM OF PAIN, HANNAH RUNS DOWN STAIRS NAT CONTINUES TO SCREAM UPSTAIRS.
Me: “What the (expletive deleted) is going on up there”?
Nat: Ow Ow Ow
I run up the stairs (as fast as my duff hip allowed me to) to find Nat on the landing, moaning, holding his hand over his mouth, rocking from side to side asking “why’s it always me”.
They hadn’t gone to bed, of course, instead they had chased each other from bedroom to bedroom in an increasingly frenzied manner until finally the inevitable happened and Han slammed her door in Nat’s face catching him in the mouth with the handle smack plum between the teeth and possibly loosening one in the process!
By this point, however, I had little sympathy for Nat’s injury which had been caused by his own misbehaviour.
They had ruined L&O (luckily I was recording it in anticipation of missing the beginning – not that they were told this), once again they had not done what they were told to do:
Now, Finally, It Was Time To Unleash The Daddy Volcano.
Nat managed to make this eruption twice as bad as it would have been when he had the audacity to say that
“I hate my life”
This, after he had spent much of the evening boasting about all the things he had done by the age of 11 and mocking me for fact that I hadn’t had the chance too do those things – this was a very very bad move on his part.
Christ he couldn’t have picked a stupider thing to say. I gave him a hell of a roasting about what he had and what others went without!! The upshot of it all was roughly the following statement
WE HAVE TRIED TO TREAT YOU LIKE HUMAN BEINGS BUT THAT OBVIOUSLY DOESN’T WORK; SO MUCH FOR TRYING THE CARROT, GET READY TO MEET THE (metaphorical) STICK.
1. Han – No iPod until I give it back so no Harry Potter audio books at bed time.
2. Han – No videos in bedroom
3. Nat – Bedroom computer pass worded and out of bounds until I say other wise
4. Nat & Han – ditto downstairs computer.
5. by the way don’t turn on the downstairs TV without permission
.
The worm has turned, the above routine will continue until such time as we see a marked change in behaviour. No more chasing in the morning, no more messing about at bedtime!
**(thank you President Nixon’s Secretary).
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